The War of the Crimson Cheeks
by Thumbtax
Summary: Fionna is about to be honored for her thousandth heroic act with a statue in front of the palace, carved of finest rock candy and depicting her at her most heroic. But when Marshall Lee gets his hands on some embarrassing pictures of our heroine, he's got plans of his own...
1. Book of Memories

All character are the property of Pendleton Ward, Natasha Allegri, and Cartoon Network. If you enjoy this story, please leave a review-it's the best incentive to keep it going!

* * *

The blade of Fionna's sword tore through the air as she whirled it around in a wide arc.

_Click. Click. Click._ "Lookin' good, girl!"

She thrust it to one side, then the other, and then fell to one knee and held it straight up.

_Click. Click. _ "That's the stuff! Just try to put a _little_ more action into it!"

"More...action?" Fionna panted. She'd been swinging the sword around for almost half an hour-the numerous deep gashes and divots cut into the lawn around their tree were testament to how long and how hard she'd been "fighting". She was starting to feel just a little worn out.

"Little more," Cake clarified, stretching up and down as she looked through the camera, trying to find best angle. "Try to visualize the Ice Queen smooching your honey, and pretend you're swingin' the sword right in her face!"

"But I don't want to _kill _her," Fionna protested.

"Oh, pretend you're using the flat end, then. And give me a nice battle cry, 'kay?"

"But the camera won't record a battle cry-not that kind of camera anyway-"

"Fionna!" Cake snapped. "That's two buts I've heard now, and the only two buts I _want _to hear are your butt kicking the Ice Queen's butt!" She smoothed back her raised fur and said calmly, "It makes it look more realistic that way."

"Fine, fine." Fionna picked up the sword again. "Rrrrrrr!"

"Good energy!"

"_Ice Queeeeeeeen!_ _Get your claws off of Prince Gumball, you frozen hag!_" She swung the sword with all her might, taking a sizable chunk out of the stump she was pretending was the Ice Queen's face.

"Yikes!" Cake said, stretching herself out of the way of the backswing. "What happened to using the flat side?"

"Oh." Fionna blushed. "Sorry. I guess I got caught up in the moment."

"Don't apologize! That's what we were trying for!" Cake said, shaking the photo a few times. "Look at that! It came out great!"

"It does look pretty cool! We should use this one!"

"Naah," Cake said. "The balance is wrong. You can't use that pose for the statue in front of the palace! How's Prince Gumball gonna appreciate your fine rock candy bod if it falls over on him and skwushes him into a wad?"

"Uhmm..."

"It's really a keeper, though! I'm gonna stick this one in the scrapbook!" Cake stretched one paw up to the top window of the tree and retrieved a thick book bound in monster leather. A few loose photographs fluttered down like autumn leaves.

"Oops. We'd better make a trip to the Glue Kingdom next chance we get, so we don't lose these precious memories," Cake said, wriggling like a whip as she snatched up every last photo and stuffed them back into place.

"So, look, why don't I just raise my sword over my head or something? That's pretty heroic looking, right?"

"Heroic looking? Who's the photography expert here, me or you?"

"Uh... neither of us really knows anything about-"

"Who dug up all the cameras?"

Fionna sighed. "You."

"That's right! Now, do the same thing again, but this time try to stick your butt out a little more on the downswing. That'll counterbalance the sword."

"Cake!" Fionna protested. "Prince Gumball's going to be able to see this from his _window! _I don't want him staring at my butt every day!"

"When you've got it, girl, it doesn't hurt to advertise," Cake muttered.

"Hmmph. Okay, we'll try it your way." Fionna raised the sword again. "_How dare you touch Prince Gumball, you evil-ack!_"

She ended up face-first in the grass.

"Don't stick it out that far!" Cake started, but she was drowned out by a burst of laughter from above. Fionna rolled over in time to see a dark figure materializing against the deep and luscious greens of the canopy.

"Marshall Lee!" Cake hissed. "You get out of here! This is a private photography session!"

"Sorry. I didn't mean for you to hear me. I just couldn't help myself, you know?" He hopped off the branch and towards the ground. "Hey, Fionna."

She ignored the hand he was offering and pointedly jumped to her feet on her own. "Hello, Marshall Lee."

"What is all this biz anyway?"

"Oh, uh, it's really not that big a deal. I rescued some candy people from the stomach of an evil cloud turtle, and they sort of...want to build a statue of me, now."

"It's not just for that!" Cake said. "It's to commemorate your one thousandth heroic act."

"But that's what adventurers do!" Fionna protested. "True adventurers aren't supposed to get things for helping people."

"What about when we saved Tree Trunks from that genie skeleton and he made us that pot of his famous five-alarm chili?"

"He would have made it anyway! And we would have eaten it anyway! So that doesn't count!"

"Hey, if Prince Stickybutt wants a chunk of candy to look at, let him," Marshall Lee said with a half-smirk. "I'd rather scope the real thing."

Fionna was suddenly aware of how close he'd drifted to her. She could see one of his little fangs exposed, the tip pushing into the dark grey of his lips, and she could smell the musky vampire scent. It wasn't disgusting or rotten; it was mild and earthy, like a hint of cool, rich soil after a rain.

She really hoped her breath didn't still smell like chili.

"Mmm," Marshall said, putting his lips to her cheek. She could feel her face getting hot.

"M-marshall, hey," she laughed nervously, "what are you-"

Then she felt the blush fading. Marshall stepped back, licking his lips. "Mmm-mmm. I should embarrass you more often."

Suddenly a yellow-and-white net exploded around him and the Vampire King was tangled up on the ground. A particularly thick strand of netting with angrily at him.

"What's the big idea, Marshall Lee? If you turn her grey, you're gonna end up black and blue!"

"Relax," Marshall laughed, turning into a bat for just long enough to slip through the fleshy strands. "I've only been doing this for a thousand years. I think I know what I'm doing. Hey, what's _this?_"

He picked up the dropped scrapbook and flipped through the pages. "You've already got a zillion photos here. Why not use one of them?"

"They're not that great," Fionna said.

"Oh, there have to be _some_ good pics in here." He pulled out a picture. "How about this one?"

Fionna looked at it. It was one of the earliest pictures in the album, and depicted a baby girl in a bunny hood running through the grass with no diaper on.

"Ha, ha, yeah, right, Marshall. I think they want one where I'm a _little _bigger than that."

"Bigger, huh?" Marshall flipped through the pages. "Whoa. Speaking of. So _this_ is what you look like when you let it all hang out."

He flipped over the picure to reveal a shot of a distinctly chubby-looking Fionna asleep on the couch, a half-empty ice-cream carton resting on her pot belly.

"Wh-no!" Fionna said. "That's not me! I mean... it is me, but it's just because we found these businesswomen frozen in some ice and we got a little lazy! I don't look like that anymore!"

"Yeah, 'cause you're sucking it in."

"I am not!" Fionna said hotly. "I'm in totally exponential shape!"

"Come on," Marshall said, poking her middle. "Let go. Embrace your inner butterball."

"Hey! Hands off my gut-meats, mister!"

"Okay, okay. Well, let's see, there's this picture...

-_Fionna, after she shaved her head to make a beard for that evil tree wizard_-

"Or this one, maybe..."

-_that time she got all her clothes stolen in the middle of the City of Thieves-_-

"Or maybe this..."

-_the time the Magic Woman turned her into a giant foot!_-

"Cake, why did you take all these pictures, anyway?" Fionna muttered sourly.

"They'll make magical memories someday," the cat said. "If that nasty boy doesn't shmurtz them all up with his vampire claws!"

"I'm not going to hurt your pics," Marshall said, twirling the book lazily on one finger. "In fact, I'm going to help. I'll pick out the very best photo and deliver it to the royal sculptor myself."

"That's okay. Really." Fionna reached for the album, but Marshall was already drifting towards the edge of the shadow and unfolding his umbrella.

"Oh, it's no trouble. Besides, there's things in here that ol' Pinky just _has_ to see. And your face _does_ turn the tastiest shade of red."

"Marshall!-" she began, but he was already lifting off into the sky, fading away as he did so. Cake's arms shot out after him, but it was too late. He was already gone.

"You don't think he'd really..." Fionna said nervously.

"Oh, Fionna." Cake frowned. "_Of course he would! That jealous jerk is gonna try to ruin your reputation with Prince Gumball! You gotta go stop him_!" She spread her body out as tall and wide as a sail. "I'm gonna try and catch him in the air! _You _make for the palace, and you _better_ run like your pride depends on it!"


	2. Smirched!

This chapter is dedicated to Natasha Allegri, who I just now today met at Emerald City Comic Con, and to any of my readers who may have been among the enormous horde of Finns and Fionnas there!

* * *

Fionna had never run here from the treehouse so fast in her life. Painful stitches ran up and down her sides. Her chest burned as if she'd just inhaled a lungful of Fire Kingdom air. Her legs felt like they were about to drop off. But the thought of Marshall Lee handing all her most embarrassing photos over to Prince Gumball drove her on, through the outlying farms, across the candied paving stones, to the courtyard of the the royal palace.

Spearmint Maid was directing a work crew as they unloaded an enormous block of freshly-quarried rock candy. "Be careful!" she said. "And make sure you stand it up straight, now!"

"Now, now, Starchi knows what she's doin'," Starchi said, leaning against the slab. "Oh, hullo there, Miss Fionna!"

"H-hiiiiiii..." Fionna wheezed. Real adventurers always acknowledged a hearty greeting, even when they were about to collapse from exhaustion. She tottered through the courtyard and forced herself to take the steps three at a time.

She stopped at the top just long enough to glance back at the sky over the grasslands. She could still see a patch of gold and white against the blue. Cake was spread out like a kite, swooping along the air currents trying to catch Marshall.

Which meant he'd probably gotten past her. Fionna hastily gulped down some air and charged into the palace, through the Great Hall, up six steep flights of stairs, and into the long corridor that led to Prince Gumball's personal chambers. Her legs pumped madly as she tore down the passage.

Just when the prince's door was in sight, something long and skinny shot out in front of her, and she went flying. She sailed a good twenty feet before slamming into the carpet.

"Owwww..." she muttered into the rich magenta pile.

"Nnnnnnyou're trying to get ahead of us!" screeched a piercing voice. "You have no right, no right!"

"That's right, sister! That's right! No right! We were here first. NNNNNYYYAAA!"

Fionna picked herself off the carpet and turned to face the two women. Skinny and yellow-peeled, they were as alike as twins, except that one wore a gown of pure white and hid her face behind a matching fan, while the other's dress and fan were black...and also, one of the second twin's lanky legs was stretched right across the hall.

"Hey! What the fletch was that, Contessa?" Fionna snapped. "You just tripped me!"

"LIAR!" the first Contessa d'Lemongrab shrieked. "We are here to see Father, yes, here on urgent business. We were here first!"

"We can put our legs where we want! They are our legs!"

"Yes, sister! She should mind her own legs!"

"Yes, she should! Indeed!"

Out of the corner of her eye, Fionna caught a dark shape passing by the window. She turned to see Marshall, grinning at her from under the dark canopy of his umbrella.

"Marshall!" She ran to the window. "You didn't-"

He handed her the album. "Here you go."

"Oh. Phew."

"A little bat already dropped the _best_ pictures off on Pink-Boy's windowsill." He smiled at her.

"WHAT?" Fionna turned to the door to Gumball's private chambers. "Oh, _smoo!_"

She sprinted the rest of the way to the door. There was a peanut-brittle placard hanging on the handle with the words _Busy Doing Science, Yo_, which she ripped off without hesitation.

"Our turn first!" one of the Contessae shrieked. "We must speak to Father!"

"The garbage cans in our castle are full! They must be replaced with new, empty cans _immediately-eeeeeeeee!_"

The door was locked tight. Fionna pulled out her sword. This was an _emergency._ Putting all her muscle into it, she sliced through the thick candy wood and smashed through the doorway.

Prince Gumball was sitting at his desk by the window, dressed in his lab coat, some experiment involving a pumpkin, a jar of centipedes, and a bubbling beaker of fizzy green liquid spread out in front of him. He was neatly cutting an envelope with the Royal Letter-Opener.

"Noooooo!" Fionna cried, jumping across the room and snatching the envelope out of his surprised hands.

"Fionna, what-"

"You can't look at this. I-I gotta get rid of it!" She looked around. "I'll eat it!"

She opened wide, but Prince Gumball plucked the letter out of her fingers before she could stuff it in her mouth. "Fionna! What's gotten into you?" he asked, frowning. "The Feast of Personal Correspondence isn't for two months."

He glanced down at the envelope. "But, but this is from _you!_ Ah, this must be the model for the statue. I'm glad you finally sent it along so we can get started."

"No! Don't look at it!"

"Fionna?" He looked puzzled.

"It's...it's... a really bad shot! I'll send you the real one...later."

"There's something you're not telling me, isn't there?" He peered at her. "Did you accidentally take pictures of another Medusa?"

"No, it's just..." She gulped. "MarshallLeestolesomesuperper sonalphotosfrommeandhestotal lytryingtoembarrassmebygivin gthemtoyyou!"

"Oh. Oh, I see!" Gumball said. He quickly put the letter down on the desk and pushed it away. "Of course I won't look at it."

"Oh, thank glob."

"As a prince, I would never do anything so uncouth as to peep at a lady's embarrassing business. Especially when that lady is the one who's toiled so tirelessly to keep the Candy Kingdom safe from monsters. I'll dispatch a phalanx of banana guards to bring that ruffian to justice."

"Uh, the only thing that'll get you is a lot of banana pudding." Fionna laughed. "Anyway, I don't really want to arrest him or anything. I just kind of want to-"

"Get him back?"

"_Ohhhhhh_ yeah."

Prince Gumball looked back and forth. "Follow me."

"To where?"

"Marshall Lee attempted to besmirch your honor. We must adjourn to the Chamber of Resmirchment to proceed. Come, over here."

"That's your pantaloon closet."

"No, it's the Chamber of Resmirchment. I just don't use it very much, so I keep my pantaloons in there too."

The Chamber of Resmirchment was a small fudge-brick room with a holder in the middle for a torch. With the flame lit and burning an eerie green-orange, it was easy to forget about all the pantaloons.

"Under Candy Kingdom law, any attack on the champion of the Candy Kingdom is an attack on me," Gumball intoned, the eldritch light playing over his face. "An attempt was made on my champion, and as ruler, I do solemnly swear that I shall not rest until the fell Vampire King is _totally gotten back _for his misdeeds."

"Pants on fire."

"That was a royal vow, Fionna, I assure you it was one hundred percent truthful."

"No, I mean, _pants on fire!_"

"Oh." He patted out the flame playing over the cuff of one of the pantaloons, which had dragged across the torch. "Excuse me."

"No problem." Fionna grinned. "Back to the him-getting?"

"Of course."


	3. Nemesis

"But how are we going to embarrass Marshall Lee?" Fionna asked. "I mean, I don't think it'll be easy. He's pretty cool."

"As with everything in life, with the help of SCIENCE, of course," Gumball explained. He wheeled his white chocolate whiteboard into the Chamber of Resmirchment and began covering it with equations. "By analyzing Tramnoid's Curve, we see that the embarrassment potential for any life-form peaks in late puberty, while that potential is minimized at the extreme ends of the lifespan; the least prone to embarrassment, and hence the least guarded, are those in infancy or old age. So, by taking evidence from each tail of the curve and applying it here at the apex, we can maximum the effectiveness of our attempt."

"Uhh?"

"If we show off his baby pictures in public, he'll be _super embarrassed_," Gumball clarified.

"Oh!" Fionna scratched her head. "Uh, but Marshall's a thousand years old. If he even has baby pictures, they're probably underground or at the bottom of the sea by now."

"Yes, I thought of that. That's why we're going to make _new_ baby pictures."

"Huh? How?"

Gumball looked around the small room, carefully, as if someone might be hiding in the pantaloons.

"Have you ever heard of the Mountain of Youth?"

* * *

Fionna and Cake trudged up the rocky trail, an icy wind lashing them with flecks of hail and gravel from the poorly-maintained path. Cake had stretched herself out to twenty feet, and was wrapped around Fionna's neck like a warm, cozy scarf.

"Well, I don't like this," the cat grumbled, her voice modulating oddly as her head whipped around in the breeze. "I still say we just oughtta catch that boy and knock some sense into his moldy old undead head."

"Cake! That wouldn't be cool! He was going to embarrass us, so we're going to embarrass him. It's, you know, karma."

"Well, I wouldn't have taught you about the path to inner peace and perfect balance if I'd know you would use it as an excuse to get out of handing out butt-whoopings."

"Butt-whoopings are always more fun when they come at the end of a big adventure!" Fionna said cheerfully. "And we might end up getting to whoop the Ice Queen's. Prince Gumball said we had to get water from the Mountain of Youth, and the only mountains made of water I know are in her kingdom."

"Whooping Marshall Lee's butt would be more fun, though," Cake muttered.

"Now that you mention it, you're probably right," Fionna said slyly. "That _would_ be fun."

"Get your mind out of the gutter! I didn't mean it like that!"

"Too bad, I'm putting it on the list." Fionna pulled a notebook covered with glitter and puffy stickers and bearing the title 'BIG ADVENTURE IDEA LIST' out of her backpack, flipped it open, and started to write.

"Fionna! You're not really putting that down!"

"Maybe I am and maybe I'm not."  
"That's _permanent marker! Fionna!" _Cake twined herself around Fionna's arm and snapped at the pen. "If you put it down then you have to do it!"

"Oh, too bad, I guess I just have to do it, then!"

Cake wove herself between Fionna's legs, the girl tottered and fell over.

"Ow." Fionna giggled. "Heh heh."

Cake laughed as well. Pretty soon both of them were lying on the ground, whooping it up.

"Ooooh," Fionna said, finally, getting a grip on herself. "I think I sprained my stomach or something."

"Ahaha." Cake wiped away a tear.

Fionna padded the ground next to her. "Rats."

"Rats, what?"

"Rats, I think I dropped the pen over the cliff."

They broke out into giggles again.

"So is everyone invited to this party, or do you have to submit proof that you're a total banana bar?" said a familiar voice. Marshall Lee appeared in front of them, floating a few feet above the path. Fionna rolled to her feet hurriedly, and Cake took a step back, her hair standing up and her back arched the way only a magic shape-shifting cat can.

"This is a private adventure!" she said.

"Hey, it's cool. Room for one more?"

"Sorry, Marshall," Fionna said with a grin. "You can't go on this one."

"Why not?"

"Oh, you'll find out soon enough. It's a secret."

"Trying to get me back for the thing with the album?"

"Uh...maybe, maybe not."

"Stooping to my level. I like it." He smiled, showing off his sharp little fangs. "It means I'm corrupting you."

"Hey! You don't get to act all happy about this! You totally tried to embarrass me, and now I'm gonna return the favor!"

"Poor, poor Fionna. We both know this is gonna end with me slurping up that tasty red out of your cheeks. Why not give up now?"

"No way!" Fionna pointed dramatically. "You're going down!"

"You tell him!" Cake cheered.

"Ooh. I'm glad to hear it." Marshall leaned forward. "'Cause it means I get to be your _nemesis._ This is gonna be fun."

"Yeah, well... we'll see if you think it's so fun when I...when I..." Fionna shut her mouth, with some difficulty; _don't spill the beans!_ she warned herself.

"When you whoop my butt?" the vampire boy said, putting his arms behind his head and floating lazily upward. "I don't know, Fionna, it sounds like you're maybe a little too into my butt, you know?"

"You heard that? I mean-n-no I'm not!" Fionna blushed.

"Oh, yeah, there's that yummy blush." Marshall spun around in the air, so he was lying face down. "Now let's see if we can ripen it up a little. I'm gonna make you glow like a radioactive beet before this adventure is finished."

"Oh yeah? And how exactly do you intend to do that?"

"You'll find out," Marshall said, fading out with an evil chuckle. "And then I'm gonna _drink you up!_"


	4. Cold Old Bones

Howling winds whipped at Fionna's hair and icy snow scoured her exposed face. Even with Cake forming a set of long underwear, she could feel how cold it was here in the Ice Kingdom's frigid interior, especially in the middle of a storm.

"G-g-got to keep g-g-g-going..." she chattered.

"Shh!" Cake said. "Your tongue will freeze again. Just think warm thoughts."

Fionna thought about warm summer days in the Grasslands. She thought about diving into Gumball's hot chocolate swimming pool. She thought wrapping herself up like a baked potato and snuggling with the Fire Prince.

"Whoo, you just heated up a little," Cake observed. "Whatever that last one was, keep thinkin' that!"

"Mmm-hmm," Fionna nodded, starting a tickle fight in her mind.

Her fantasies kept her from freezing solid, but the ice crystals blasting at her like scouring powder on the frigid wind continued to take their toll. Fionna saw a cave looming up out of the snow, a blue-black tunnel into blinding whiteness, and stumbled inside.

"That vampire boy's going too far!" Cake groused. "What's he tryin' to do, turn us into popsicles?"

"Come on, Cake, Marshall Lee can't control the weather," Fionna said. "I think."

"Vampires have all sorts of evil powers!"

Fionna gazed out into the storm. "So does the Ice Queen. But I'm not even sure we're close to her lair. We could be anywhere."

She brushed a section of the floor free of snow and built a cozy fire using kindling and tinder from her pack. Cake stretched over her in the shape of a tent, leaving a small gap at the top for the smoke to come out, and basked in the heat, contracting and re-spreading herself every few minutes in order to warm different parts of her surface, while Fionna roasted a few non-sentient hot dogs over the flames.

Suddenly, she heard something over the crackling of the fire and the sizzling of hot dog meats.

"Cake!" she hissed. "Someone's in the back of the cave!"

"I heard! They're coming this way!" the cat responded. "Quick, put the fire out!"

"I'm trying! Ow!" Fionna put a finger in her mouth, sucking on the burn.

"We might be lookin' at a heavy-duty ice monster battle!" Cake said. "You know what to do!"

"Yeah!"

They quickly gobbled down the hot dogs, for energy. Then Fionna drew her sword.

"-did you see that?" said a raspy voice from the darkness. "He was all like, woosh, and I was like, no way! Bam!"

"Yah," another voice replied. The fading light of the dying embers glinted off of polished metal and luminous ivory as the cave-dwellers lurched forward.

"Ice skeletons!" Fionna said, leaping forward and severing the skull of the first from its bony shoulders. "Get 'em!"

"Whoa!" said the skull, rolling to a stop. "There's, like, chicks in here."

"Whaaa?" the second skeleton grunted.

"Cake!" Fionna said. "These aren't just ice skeletons! T-they're naked guy ice skeletons!" She pointed to the back of the cave, where cubbies stuffed with armor were just visible carved into the walls of ice. "And we're in their locker room!"

Her cheeks began to turn pink.

"Hey, Marshall Lee said this would totally be a good place to change after iceball practice," the headless skeleton complained. "I didn't know there'd be like cat and bunny chicks in here perving on us!"

"Let's snap 'em in the butt with wet towels!"

"Dude, the wet towels are, like... totally frozen."

"Oh. Well... let's bash 'em over the head, then! Like clubs and stuff!"

Fionna's sword slashed through the flailing towels, splintering them into shards of terrycloth, as Cake pummeled the skeletons with battering ram fists. They fought through the advancing horde, scattering bones in all directions, and plunged deeper into the cave. Skeletons yelped and shouted with husky voices and covered their pelvises as she ran past, blushing furiously.

"Fionna! Don't be a wimp!" Cake advised her. "Not like you've never seen a naked skeleton before, anyway!"

"B-but they're covering themselves! That makes them so much nakeder!"

"How?"

"I-I don't know, okay! It just does!"

Fionna lost track of the twists and turns they took as the two adventurers plunged deeper into the heart of the mountain range. In time, the shouts of the skeletons faded behind them, and they were able to make their way more cautiously into the dark. Tiny ice-rats chittered and scuttled along the walls, and frost-blue mushrooms lit their path with an eerie inner glow.

"Hold on," Cake said. "This...this looks familiar."

"Cake?"

"Turn left here," the cat said excitedly. "Now forward... right, here... a-ha!"

They stepped out into an enormous room filled with drifts of paper and jumbled heaps of boxes.

"Huh?" Fionna said. "Looks like a storeroom for old junk."

"Uh-huh," Cake nodded. "A storeroom for the _Ice Queen's_ old junk."

"You mean...?"

"We're directly under her palace right now!" Cake looked around. "If there are any records of where to find the Mountain of Youth, they'll be in here..."

Misty clouds swirled around the steepest peaks of the tottering piles. It was like looking at the Ice Kingdom in miniature.

"...somewhere."


	5. The Book of Cake

"Cake! Cake! I found something!" Fionna said. "Look, it's part of an old map!"

"Way to go! Where'd you find that?"

"Oh, uh," Fionna mumbled. "It was in an...old magazine."

Cake narrowed her eyes and a shy smile across her face. "What old magazine?"

"Uhmmm...just...ShirtlessSexyWizardDudesMonthly," Fionna babbled.

"O-ho!"

"But I was only reading it for the maps, okay?" the girl protested. "See? The Mountain of Youth."

She dangled a strip of parchment in front of Cake's face. A craggy outcropping had been crudely inscribed in faded blue ink, and on the slopes were written the words MOUN, OF, and YO.

"That says 'Moun of Yo'," Cake pointed out.

"The map is torn. I think she was using it as a bookmark or something. But come on, it's got to be the Mountain of Youth!"

"I don't know. That could just say 'mound of yogurt'."

Fionna looked thoughtful. "Well... at least then we'd have a mound of yogurt to eat, right?"

Blue light blazed from the far end of the room, illuminating the heaps of brittle books. Fionna covered her eyes. She could see just well enough to make out a familiar silhouette near the mouth of the enormous cavern.

"The Ice Queen! Get down!" Cake shoved Fionna into a pile of scrolls and old video tapes, then quickly squeezed herself into the shape of a book and hopped on top of the protruding bunny ears.

"Gertrude? Gertrude, are you down here?" the Ice Queen called, wandering into the room. She was dressed in a blue terrycloth bathroom and carried a mug of frozen hot chocolate. "I heeeeard somebody in here, knocking over Mommy's books. I think somebody needs a little time-out-ooh, what's this?"

She stopped right in front of the pile where Fionna and Cake were hiding.

"I don't remember this one. What is this, cat-skin?"

Fionna felt Cake shiver as the Ice Queen's frigid nails scritched her "cover". Quietly grunting, she forced out a series of raised letters.

"Boring Book The Ice Queen Doesn't Even Like," the Ice Queen read. "I guess there's no point in looking at it, then."

The girls heaved two silent sighs of relief.

"On the other hand, Abracadanielle _did _say I could improve my magic if I studied outside my comfort zone. What the heck!"

She snatched Cake off the pile. Fionna stifled an 'eek' as her hood's ears popped out into full view, but the frosty monarch didn't even notice them. She was too busy 'opening' Cake and reading her first page.

"Once there was a sorceress called the Ice Queen," she read, as the cat struggled to emboss the words onto her pages quickly enough. "She was about a million years old, but she only liked really young dudes, and it was really creepy and everyone thought she should knock it off. Also, she had a SUPER ENORMOUS butt. It was so big that when she sat down, she got taller. ...HEY!"

Fionna had both hands clamped over her mouth, struggling not to laugh. A moment later, she had to choke back a cry of pain as the Ice Queen dropped Cake angrily back onto her head.

"That book was right!" the sorceress snapped. "About me not liking it, I mean. Not about my butt! It's not super enormous! It's barely even _regular _enormous! _And when I hit on dudes it's not creepy, it's flattering!"_

Still grumbling, she stormed out, angrily licking at her hot chocolatesicle. As soon as the coast was clear, Cake slithered off of the pile.

"Oww," she groused. "Your head is too hard, girl!"

"Well, you're too heavy! I coulda broken my neck! Not to mention I've got some dumb tape jabbing into my side..." Fionna picked up the tape and read the faded label. "Wait a minute. _Wait a minute! _ Cake, look at this!"

* * *

"AHAHAHAHAHA!"

Fionna rolled across the floor of the tree house, laughing so hard she couldn't breathe.

"Don't... don't hurt yourself," Cake choked out. Her arms were as long as garden hoses, wrapped around and around herself to keep her sides from splitting.

"It's... so... hic!...funny...hic!" Fionna coughed. "Ohhhh man."

"I'm glad we could have so much fun!" BMO chirped merrily, dancing around.

"Thanks for playing the video for us, BMO," Fionna said. A wicked smile spread across her face. "This has got to be the most embarrassing thing _ever!_"

"Marshall Lee is gonna die of humiliation if this gets out!" Cake agreed. "I mean un-die."

Fionna ejected the tape and tapped the label, which read _Marshall Lee-I.A.L.T._ in a slightly less insane and scrawly version of the Ice Queen's usual insane scrawl. "Now, all we gotta do is find the right moment to show _everybody!_"

"You should do it at the statue ceremony this afternoon!" BMO said.

"The what?"

"The statue ceremony!" BMO repeated, pulling out a pair of envelopes. "Your invitations came while you were out on your adventure. Everyone will be there! You can go up on stage and we can pull some pranks together!" The little robot covered its mouth and giggled.

Fionna ripped the envelope apart. "No, no, no, how could they have built it already, we never even gave them a good picture-unless-"

"Unless they used the picture that was already there!" Cake cried.

"Nooo! Gumball promised he _wouldn't!_"

"I smell a stinky vampire behind all of this!" Cake said. "Let's go mess up his business!"

Fionna snatched up her sword in one hand and the videotape in the other.

"Gladly! I'll _see you_ at that ceremony, Marshall Lee. And we'll just see who gets embarrassed by _who!_"


	6. Crimson Cheeks

Fireworks bloomed in the Candy Kingdom sky like great shimmering flowers. The crowd milled around on the walkway leading to the palace, some casting furtive glances at the mountains of cloth drapings concealing the new statue, some ogling it with open curiosity. If you looked carefully, you could just make out the shape of a pair of points at the top, like bunny ears, but beyond that, it was impossible to tell what the statue depicted. A baby marshmallow, poked and prodded by his fellows, ran towards the edge of the curtain, but was shooed off by the ever-watchful banana guards.

"Darn it, they did build it!" Fionna fumed. "Right there where everyone can see it, too!"

"The unveiling's not for...hmm...ten minutes," Cake said. "Let's sneak under the sheet and eat up all the rock candy!"

"Cake, my record for eating rock candy is like six pounds in an hour. And even that made me feel kinda gross. And your record was even worse! I don't think we can make a difference."

"That was 'cause my teeth weren't made for chewing that stuff!" Cake explained. "But if I make my throat real gigantic, I can just swallow it!"

"No. We've got this." Fionna held up the video. "BMO, are you ready?"

"Aye-aye!"  
Tucking BMO under her arm, Fionna sprinted through the crowd and vaulted onto the stage. "Candy people of the candy kingdom!"

"Look, it's Fionna!" yelled a toffee. Several of the candy people clapped appreciatively and whooped.

"No, hold your whooping! I know you're all waiting to see the statue-"

There were scattered cheers, and more whoops from those with poor whoop-holding skills.

"But the truth is, it's been sabotaged! Sabotaged by_ him!_"

She pointed to the dark speck lounging under a dark parasol on a slope about two-thirds of the way up the draped form. Marshall Lee peeked out from under the parasol, twitched his nose, and waved a wing in a lazy greeting.

"'Sup, Fionna."

"Don't sup me! I know what you've been up to, trying to embarrass me!"

"Hey, I've just been hanging out here having a nice nap on your big rock candy mountains." He thumped the slope beneath him.

"I bet you're looking forward to everyone seeing...seeing whatever it is you did!"

"I didn't do anything."

"You liar! You made sure the sculptors got that picture!"

"Oh. Okay, I did do that."

Fionna growled. "Well, nobody's even gonna be looking at that statue after they see _this!_ BMO! Play the tape! Extra-watchy mode, please, so every can see!"

BMO did a little dance, and a holographic projection appeared above the stage.

The scene was of ruined cities and smoking craters. Ancient flying machines tore through the blackened skies, and columns of fire bloomed like weeds where they passed.

"This is Simone, it's-I'm not even sure of the date, anymore, but it's the sixth winter since the war started. We've spent the past few weeks heading toward Juneau on the hope that it might have been remote enough that humans might have survived. No luck. What little of the city isn't overrun by mutants has been bombed into powder. We thought we'd found pilots, some surviving branch of the Air Force, spent hours trying to wave one down until we realized they were drones, just an automated system."

"Blah, blah, blah," Fionna said. "Fast forward."

"-feel continually drawn farther north. I can't imagine how cold it must be now, but he doesn't feel it much and me, not at all, of course. I wonder, if I made it all the way to the pole, would I achieve some measure of relief from the-"

"No, farther, farther. Okay, there! Stop!"

Marshall Lee, a thousand years younger-he looked about seven-was tottering on the hood of a car. He was grubby, dressed in a raggy T-shirt and old tighty whiteys.

"Awww," said the candy people.

"I'm gonna do my song now!" he said cheerfully.

"Okay, go ahead and do your song," the woman on the video said. "I'm recording."

"Okay!" Marshall sang,

"_I'm a little teapot, short and stout,_"

He put one hand on his hip.

"_This is my handle..._"

He held up another hand.

"_And this is my spout! When I get all steamed up-_"

"Marshall..."

"_-then I shout! Tip-_"

"Marshall, you need to fix your underwear. I can see your-" the woman laughed, "I can see your spout, honey."

The young Marshall on the video looked shocked and covered himself up. "Hey!"

"I don't think I want to drink any the tea you pour with that spout. Oh, cheer up, we'll get you some news ones. That Target down the highway was mostly intact, we'll go back there."

The candy people, many of whom weren't especially well-educated about human anatomy, were slow to start laughing, but once some of the more perceptive ones had explained it to the rest of them, they were rolling in the aisles.

"Oh em glee, Marshall Lee," Lumpy Space Prince yelled. "I am totally sending that to lumping everybody! I'm gonna call it marshall_lee_underwear_fail so everybody save it in case my stupid parents make me take it down for bullying or some junk."

"Eet's funny because you can zee hees candy cane!" Chocobarry said.

"I don't know if I like that comparison," said a candy cane.

Marshall Lee, in his most human form, dropped gracefully to the stage. "That really wasn't cool, Fionna."

"Ha! You're embarrassed_,_ aren't you!"

"Eh. Little, I guess. But I was a little kid. Who cares?" He frowned. "Mostly I'm just disappointed that you would take it this far."

"But-hey, don't try to pull that! You _started this!_"

"I was just joking around. I would never really humiliate you in public like that. I mean, come on. Kind of petty and lame if you ask me. But if it was _that_ important to you, hey, take it, I guess."

"B-but-but-the statue! You're the one who went out of your way to pick out a humiliating picture just so you could embarrass me with that giant-"

"Oh, this statue?" He swooped over to the draperies and seized them, using his vampire strength to part the sea of cloth and pull them to the floor. Fionna gasped. The rock candy sculpture sparkled in the sun, every chisel stroke a carefully-planned masterpiece. It depicted her standing with her sword drawn, one foot planted on a severed monster head, with a fierce grin on her face. She looked strong and savage and beautiful all at once. The kingdom's noble protector.

"But-but-but," Fionna stammered, "you _said_..."

"I told you. I was just messing around."

"Oh my glob, you guys," LSP said, "Marshall Lee was trying to be nice to Fionna and she completely dissed him. She's such a lumping ice queen, in, like, the lowercase sense of the word, you know? I'm gonna send this to all my friends so none of us accidentally date her."

The candy people started murmuring unhappily amongst each other. Several of them shrugged on wrappers and started heading home, sour looks on their faces. Fionna felt her cheeks burning.

"Fionnaaaaa..." Marshall whispered into her ear.

"What?"  
"I win!" he laughed. And he sucked the blush right out of her cheeks.

THE END


End file.
